


Family dinner night

by dragoneyes



Series: The Prince and The Dragon [8]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Cas does whatever he wants, Crack, Dragon!Cas, F/M, Fluff, I have no control over these characters whatsoever, Interspecies Romance, M/M, Mary does whatever she wants, just a tiny smudge of angst for this one, prince!Dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-12
Updated: 2015-02-12
Packaged: 2018-03-12 02:57:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3341024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragoneyes/pseuds/dragoneyes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is awkward and then there is <i>awkward</i>. Dean is not surprised that he manages to experience both in the timespan of a dinner.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Family dinner night

**Author's Note:**

> I give up on making plans. These characters do whatever they want anyway.

Generally speaking, Dean thought himself to be pretty good at facing dangers.

In spite of being a crown prince, he had his fair share of close encounters with flesh-eating monsters, especially since, whenever his baby brother was sent to vanquish the newest menace to their people with his Knights, Dean was almost physically unable to let him face the threat without himself tagging along to make sure Sam came out of it unscathed.

(Incidentally, this tendency of his was also completely disapproved by his father, but the crown prince had long since developed an uncanny ability to disregard any order to "Stay put while your brother takes care of it" by rationalizing the king's demands as him being just too prone to worry when it came down to his sons.)

This had resulted in Dean having faced most of the more common supernatural creatures in existence by the time he hit his twenty-fifth of life.

Ghosts? Boringly common.

Werewolves? Not as common, but still likely to be in need of ganking.

Vampires? Eh, a few.

This without considering the fact that he hanged out with a dragon on an almost daily basis.

The point was: Dean was used to enter any kind of dangerous situation and still being able to both keep a cool head and form a plan of attack even under the direst of circumstances, but the heavy air that could be breathed in the dining hall when his mother decided to invite his – very much magical, very much non-human – friend to dinner was a bit too much even for him to stand without feeling the need to grab Cas by an arm and bolt out of the room together as fast as possible.

Judging by the constipated look on his father's face in front of him, the prince wasn't the only one having trouble adapting to the current situation.

"So, Castiel," his mother's voice brought Dean's attention back from the fight-or-flight urges he was currently experiencing and trying very hard to resist. She was calmly eating her dinner, like there wasn't a dragon currently sitting at the table next to Dean and staring at the silverware in front of him, as if he were trying to figure out if he was allowed to eat them as well as the content of his plate.

"How is it that you started kidnapping my son exactly?"

It took a moment for Castiel to bring his focus back on their current predicament, his dragon instincts having taken over as soon as silver had been placed in his immediate vicinity, and he slowly raised his gaze to Mary, tilting his head on one side while he pondered on the question for a moment. Then his lips quirked upwards in amusement and he sent a fond glance in Dean's direction, like that particular event had been all his fault.

"By accident," he replied.

"Hey, don't look at me like that! You're the one going around stealing random wagons!" the prince protested with a quick slap to the dragon's closest shoulder. The other didn't even flinch, continuing to stare back at him with indulgence.

" _Anyway_ ," Dean sent him a last glare before turning his attention back on his parents, "you remember how around seven months ago there were rumors about a group of bandits coming from the kingdom over and attacking the villages near the eastern border?" he started, waiting for them to nod before continuing, "Well...I might have gone to take a look for myself since you were all taking so long debating if it were just random outlaws or an actual attempt at starting a war..."

"Are you referring to that time you said you were going to visit Lady Breaden?" Mary asked with a light frown creasing her forehead, "I think I remember your father being very pleased by your decision at the time."

Of course he had been: just a few weeks prior to that, Lisa's late husband had been defeated by his illness, leaving her if not officially open to wooing – as she was still in mourning – at least perfectly available to start closing the distance between her and John's eldest son.

"Yeah, well..." Dean had the decency to blush in embarrassment when he continued, "I might have deviated a little bit without telling you..."

"Dammit, Dean!" John started to raise from his sit with the obvious intention of letting his son know just how unwelcome that reckless behavior was by the king, but he was stopped by a well-placed glare of warning from his wife.

"You were all taken by _talking_ and _discussing_ what to do," Dean was quick to explain the reasoning that had brought him to act in that way at the time, "while people were getting robbed or – worse – murdered because you wouldn't just send anyone to help without making sure that there wasn't an army waiting in ambush!" his voice becoming frustrated, while he recalled how annoyed he had felt when he noticed how everyone seemed to ignore the fact that people were in danger and there was no time to waste in chitchats, "So I though I would gather information firsthand for you."

Both his parents stared at him, Mary with consideration while John's expression was more difficult to interpret: he was looking at his son like he was considering opening his mind to see what was swirling inside of it to make him act in such a brazen way.

"Dammit, Dean..." he sighed again in the end, his tone softer while he rubbed his face in a sign of distress at the thought that his son _yet again_ had put himself into arm's way without thinking things through first. "Couldn't you have just said something about it?"

"I tried, but you weren't listening," Dean replied in an equally quiet tone, "you never do."

They stared at each other, the king looking pained while the prince once again felt like squirming under his judging gaze. Maybe John wasn't doing it on purpose, but the younger Winchester still felt like his every move was being evaluated and compared to whatever image of an ideal son the other had.

He was a complete failure, wasn't he?

It would have been so much better if Sam had been the first son, wouldn't it? He and John might fight and argue like two bulls in the same ring, but his brother _liked_ ruling. Heck, he was _damn good at it_ and he wasn't even supposed to be prepared to become king one day.

Dean was...he was kind of redundant, wasn't he? Sam could do everything that Dean himself was able to and far more efficiently than he could ever hope to be: the only thing the older prince was good at was fighting with his sword and, not only his brother was a damn fine Captain of the Royal Knights, but he also found time to rack his brains on finding solutions to political issues that Dean had no idea where to even start thinking about.

And what did Dean do while his brother took the weight of both their jobs on himself? He frolicked with his dragon friend – boyfriend? Fuck-buddy? How did Cas even consider him? Was he even good enough to be called the other's mate to begin with? Cas was a dragon, he could do so much better than Dean if he only decided to get his ass out of his cave and search for a proper dragon companion to nest with.

The prince could feel the corners of his eyes sting from the tears that were starting to crowd under their lids, while his throat clenched so tightly that breathing normally was becoming more and more difficult with every passing second.

Well, shit. There it was! He was a freaking mess after all.

There was no way he could possibly lead a whole country like he was: he had trouble getting a hold on himself, how was he supposed to take care of thousands of people who looked up to him for guidance?

He couldn't do this.

He couldn't do this.

He couldn't do—

A hand wrapped around his upper arm and his internal monologue stopped abruptly. He raised his gaze, only vaguely aware of the fact that his eyes were wide in the panic that had started to slowly creeping on him from the inside, only to find a pair of blue soul-searing orbs staring right into his own, only a few inches separating them. Castiel's fingers felt warm even through the fabric of Dean's shirt and, while the dragon's focus was complete and unyielding, his hold was gentle and careful.

There was a reassuring tingling sensation spreading from where the prince was being touched, something sweet and filled with affection that wrapped itself around him like a soft woolen blanked in the coldest months of the year, or the kind hands of a stranger closing in a protective shield around a small, abandoned bird. It made his heart quicken for a whole other reason than the anxiety coursing through him just a few moments before, and his face grew warmer when the fingers on his arm moved up to grasp his left shoulder in a gesture of reassurance.

"Breath, Dean," Cas ordered, his voice so filled with purpose that it was almost mesmerizing.

He took a breath, and then another, feeling all the tenseness wash away from his sore muscles under the influence of that tingling sensation that still buzzed just below his skin.

"Do you feel better?" the dragon asked, forehead creasing in a small frown while he studied Dean's face for any further sign of distress.

"Hum hum," the prince nodded, feeling still a bit light-headed when he asked, "What was that about?"

"You looked troubled," Castiel replied, his hand still grasping the human's shoulder without giving any sign of letting go, and the dragon peered back at him in a careful scrutiny, "I tried to soothe your mind."

That sounded...hum...

"Dude..." Dean felt his eyebrows raise in disbelief at those words, "did you just fondle my soul in front of my parents?" he couldn't help but ask, his lips twitching in amusement at that thought.

He wasn't the only one finding that idea entertaining, if the indulgent expression that made its way on Castiel's face was anything to go by.

"...maybe." and the mischievous way it was said made Dean chuckle aloud, shaking his head, because of course the dragon wouldn't find anything wrong in admitting that he had just initiated the spiritual equivalent of inappropriate touching in front of his mate's family.

"Are you all right, Dean?" Mary's quiet query brought his attention back to the two people sitting in front of them, his cheek growing warmer when he saw the worry in their eyes. The queen's was more obvious, her gaze having softened in a way that only a mother's could when she looking at her son, while the king's was a bit more difficult to notice: his expression hadn't changed much, but his mouth was now set into a troubled line and his forehead creased into a distressed frown.

"...'m fine," the prince mumbled before clearing his throat, trying to find a way to divert the attention of everyone's present from the little break down he just experienced.

"So, you were telling us about how you were 'kidnapped by accident' by Castiel..." his mother – bless her intuitive soul – prompted him to continue with how he and the dragon had met.

"Yeah, well," Dean let out a mental sigh of relief while he resumed his story. "Like I said, I was trying to gather more information about that group of bandits, right? So after a few days of searching I found them, but hum...I...kind of ended up being captured?" he grimaced, his admission sounding ridiculous even to him, "They apparently noticed they were being followed and took me by surprise, knocked me out from behind without even letting me time to realize what was going on."

"Dean..." John started again at the prince's admission, but any protest he might be thinking to express were cut short by another sharp glare of warning from his wife: after the near-panic attack her son experienced only a few minutes before, she wasn't about to let him interrupt again anytime soon.

"So, the point is," Dean was quick to take advantage of his mother's silent intervention to continue, "I woke up in some kind of covered wagon that the bandits were using to move the things they stole from one place to another," he explained, "I made sure not to bring with me anything that would give away the whole, you know, 'crown prince' thing, but I think they still believed I had to be at least from a wealthy family since I had my armor and sword with me, and they were planning to ask for some kind of ransom for my safe return. They probably would have done it too, except that..."

The prince made a vague gesture in Castiel's direction, earning a raised eyebrow in return.

"Except that _someone_ thought it was a good idea to sweep up the whole wagon right from the ground. With me still on it," he concluded with a huff of amusement.

"It smelled like silver," the dragon shrugged, as if that was a perfectly reasonable excuse for his behavior.

"Yeah, I think I saw some jewels – probably from some merchant they robbed – in the middle of all the stuff they stole," Dean distractedly commented, before turning again to his parents, "but, anyway, apparently Cas here has a wonderful sense of smell when it comes to anything valuable, but he didn't realize that he had a passenger onboard until he reached his nest!"

The heartfelt swear that left his father's mouth at those words was, to be honest, kind of expected, and when the king turned his disapproving gaze once again on him, Dean shrugged in return: John might make him feel guilty when it came down to his ability to be a proper crown prince, but the older man wasn't going to make him feel ashamed for anything that ended up with him meeting Cas.

"I was very surprised when he hopped out," the dragon mused aloud, lips slightly curving upwards as if he were replaying a fond memory in his head. "Slightly irritated, but also very surprised," he commented with a small smirk, and then added, "Once established that I had no intention of eating him in spite of all of Dean's fretting, I had to fly him down to the valley since there is no other way to leave my nest."

"So, it should have ended there, right?" the prince took back the lead of the narration while he sent a dirty glare in his friend's direction for stealing the story, "But I couldn't wrap my head around the fact that I had just faced a dragon and that dragon not only didn't try to eat me, but he also indirectly saved my ass from a group of bandits," he said, his voice becoming more excited the more he went on, "I mean, there are so many tales about how dragons are supposed to be vicious mindless beasts of destruction and all that, right? And here there was this giant lizard that, not only I had never seen around before in spite of him living at only half-a-day distance from the castle, but he was also...weirdly nonviolent. I _had_ to know what was going on!"

And really, it had all started with Dean's – probably inherited from his father – paranoia, hadn't it? Because if it weren't for him feeling like he should know for sure what that potential menace to his people was planning, he wouldn't have gone through with his following attempts at meeting the dragon over and over again.

"So I borrowed another wagon, made sure to bring with me as many silver coins as I had laying around, and waited inside of it for Cas to show up again—"

"I should have known something was wrong when the exact same fortuitous chance presented itself only at a few days of distance from the previous one..." Castiel absently commented, but he was ignored by the prince, who instead continued to speak as if the dragon had been silent the whole time.

"—and again I ended up 'kidnapped' by him," Dean explained, "...and then I brought him a deer I managed to hunt. And then at some point I started to go for a ride near the mountains in the eventuality that he would fly by, and then he kind of started to come down from his nest on his own accord whenever I was around, and then we just...you know...talked! And stuff!" he concluded with an embarrassed grin while he shared a glance with the object of his narration, receiving a look filled with amusement and affection in return.

"To be fair, you were an extremely unusual human," the dragon commented after allowing himself a few moments to gaze at the prince. "Generally speaking, your kinds tend to either run away in horror when I am around, or to battle me in order to 'free their people from the deadly beast lurking near their homes'. You are the only one I ever encountered who was so persistent in their attempts at befriending me."

"It's not like you tried to eat me the first time," the prince shrugged, ignoring the disapproving look that his father was sending in his way. He could see, out of the corner of his eye, that the king wasn't particularly happy with the story that Dean recounted, but at least he wasn't outright screaming for Castiel's blood.

It had to count for something, right?

"And what about all the times you 'kidnapped' him when he was supposed to get engaged?" John finally asked, eyes narrowing while his attention moved back on the dragon sitting at the prince's side.

"He mentioned at some point that he had no interest in marriage, but he refused to tell you outright about it, thinking that it would disappoint you," the answer was given smoothly and without hesitation, while the magical being countered the king's taunting by sending a pointed look back at him. "It seemed like the most logical solution."

"Maybe not the most logical, but it surely proved to be the one that started the most rumors," Mary's sudden chuckle reminded them that, in spite of her silence and lack of protestations so far, she was very much present at the table. Two pairs of questioning eyes belonging to the Winchester men in the room turned to stare at her at those words, while a third blue pair seemed more intrigued than worried about what she would say next.

"Well, apparently, after the third time you swept down the sky in order to protect Dean's virtue," she began, eyes gleaming bright with amusement while she peered at both the dragon and the prince, "some people started to notice that it happened whenever our son was to be engaged. At first it was the maids mentioning it when they were resting between their jobs; then some of the valets joined in; and then I found a pair of guards near the castle's gates commenting on how their prince was so dreamingly pretty that he managed to mesmerize – of all possible creatures – a dragon."

"Hey!" Dean tried to protest against being called "pretty" like he was some kind of young maiden that had just entered adulthood and was ready for marriage, but he was interrupted by his father's exclamation of protest.

"Is this a joke?!"

With a frown, the queen turned her attention on him, a pout making its way on her lips for being so rudely interrupted by her husband.

"John, I told you already," she stated, staring with flat disapproval, "you're worse than a grumpy bear. I actually make conversation with those living in this castle instead of going around with a permanent displeased frown on my face. People talk to me."

"This is ludicrous!" John was about to explain just why no-one would dare to say such things about the crown prince of the kingdom, but Mary was quicker, her reply cutting any further protest right in the bud.

"Do you remember Cassandra? The eldest child of the Robinson family?" she began, voice careful and calm on the surface but hiding what sounded like a hint of vindictive gratification underneath them, "The reason her parents declined the honor of engaging her to your son wasn't because they thought she was too inexperienced to be a proper queen, but – and this her mother told me – because they believed that a dragon was wooing him at the same time, and, to quote their words, 'they weren't about to risk her being burned to a crisp in a fit of jealousy from the prince's lizardy suitor'."

The look that passed on the king's face at those words could only be described as constipated: his brows were drawn together, his eyes narrowed in displeasure, and his nose scrunched up as if he were smelling something foul.

"I was actually the one doing the courting..." Dean was unable to refrain from adding, but he immediately shrunk back in his sit when the full force of John's glare landed on him. He had no idea how his mother managed to withstand it without breaking a sweat: it must be one of those secrets that wives traded to one another in the secrecy of their womanly affairs, there was no other possible explanation to it.

When he felt Castiel's hand wrap around his own in a gesture of reassurance, he was very grateful for the cover provided by the large table between his parents and them.

"Which is even more of a reason for me to ask," Mary commented, turning her eyes to study Castiel with the sharp attention of a wolf mother guarding her cub, "What are your intentions towards my son?"

"I would like to ask for his hand."

It was stated so simply and without hesitation by the dragon, as if it were the most obvious thing he could have replied with, that it came as no surprise to anyone in the room that the two Winchester men present both burst out in twin shouts of "WHAT?!".

"Is that not how it works for your people?" Castiel frowned in seeing father and son's equal looks of disbelief, earnest confusion pinching his brows together, "I want Dean to be mine. It was my understanding that this is how it is done among humans."

 _Yes, that's technically how it's done_ , the prince feverishly thought while his mind tried to wrap itself around what the dragon had just admitted to. Usually you were also supposed to at least talk about it with the other parties involved _before_ actually going to their parents and try to get their blessing!

"I will never allow this!" John was the first of the two to recover from his state of shock, and he jumped to his feet and slammed both his hands on the table while he continued, "Why would I ever give my son to you?!"

Looking anything but impressed, Castiel just threw him a flat look, completely ignoring the man's taunting in favor of replying, "I can pay."

"Wait, I'm the _bride_?!" Dean's head snapped towards the dragon while he gaped in outrage at the implications of his offer.

"Of course not," the other's frown only grew deeper, "I've seen more than enough times proof of your being male. Your penis is very respons—" the rest of the sentence was muffled when the prince's hand darted to shut close the dragon's completely-inappropriate mouth.

"Dammit, Cas!" he hissed, sending a wary look in his parents' direction: if his father could start shooting lightnings from his eyes, Dean had no doubt that he would have already began a long time ago. That was how displeased he looked at being reminded of just what kind of relationship ran between his firstborn and the dragon comfortably perching at their dinner table.

At least his mother seemed amused by that whole mess.

"I will never approve of...one like you," John finally spoke, gesturing at the dragon like he was some kind of mindless animal rather than a sentient magical being, "I wouldn't agree to you having my son's hand even for a thousand gold coins!"

Castiel tilted his head, blue eyes peering back at the king with no hint of faltering in their resolution.

"I was actually talking about one million twenty-three thousand six hundred seventy-four silver coins."

Every eye in the room snapped to stare at the dragon with varying degrees of disbelief – the Winchester men mostly – and intrigue – Mary, who actually leaned in a bit more on the table to better study the cause of their bafflement. Even John had to pause and gawk, eyes going wide and mouth falling open before he could even think about hiding his shock under his previously-expressed parental outrage.

"It's about a hundred thousand gold coins," Castiel helpfully provided when he saw that none of the humans present were showing any intention of wanting to speak.

Then slowly, one by one, they were released from the frozen state they had fallen in: Mary seemed both impressed and focusing very hard on not trying to laugh; John tiredly sat back on his chair, all fight suddenly drained from his posture; and Dean tucked his head in, feeling his face grow hotter and hotter until he wondered if there was even any blood left running in the rest of his body.

"You stupid lizard..." he mumbled, "that's most of your hoard..."

"It's all of my hoard down the last silver coin." Castiel gently corrected, blue eyes moving once again to make the prince the sole recipient of their gaze.

There was no way Dean could miss the part were a dragon – a creature whose main characteristic was to take, hoard, and keep – was willing to give away all of their possessions in order to have him for their own. He could feel a small sun light up inside his chest, warming his insides with delight.

"I have centuries to replenish it again," the other continued, looking at the prince as if he were staring right at his soul – and who knew, knowing Cas, he probably was – and he saw no fault to the perfection before him, "but I can only have you for fifty or sixty more years."

"You stupid lizard..." the prince repeated, his voice this time filled with fondness, while he finally broke their shared gaze to look back at his parents.

"Well, that about sums it up nicely!" Mary was the first to speak, her cheerful tone sharply contrasting with the disgruntled and somewhat defeated expression on her husband's face.

"Castiel," she said, turning to her son's suitor while the lines of her face became more serious, "I have to refuse your request for Dean's hand for now: I know nothing about you and I have no proof aside from your words that you are treating my child right," she explained, "However, you are welcome to court him properly _where we can withness it_ , and we will see after that."

"As you wish," Castiel nodded in understanding, glancing at the prince next to him to see a small grin bending his lips.

"I'll still keep an eye on you," John promised in the meantime, eyes narrowing in warning while his wife raised her eyes to the ceiling in a silent request for just a little bit more patience with her paranoid man.

"Grumpy bear," she remarked, leaning in to leave a quick but affectionate kiss on his cheek. He didn't comment, but he didn't try to threaten Castiel again either.

Dean considered it a win.

"Now go you two," Mary shushed the prince and the dragon with one hand while John's attention was still on her, "You have a chess game to finish, yes?"

"Thanks, Mom," Dean couldn't help but grin with gratefulness, knowing that, if it weren't for her mediating, the issue would have never been settled quite that easily.

"Go!" was her only reply, but the smile on her face was more than enough to let him know that she was fine with his choices.

When they stepped out of the room, Dean was sporting the biggest grin he had shown in a long, long time.

He felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, his chest was light – filled with bubbling happiness – while a pleasant buzz of contentment took over his whole body, making him grasp Castiel's hand in own, palms squeezed together and fingers entwined into an unbreakable hold.

Everything was fine and the future, for once, looked bright.

**Author's Note:**

> I made a Tumblr blog where I'll be posting all my fanfictions and fanarts, you can find it here: <http://dragon-scribbling-scribbles.tumblr.com/>
> 
> If you're interested in my personal blog instead, it's over here: <http://dragoneyes.tumblr.com/>


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